What a weekend! Lunar New Year on Friday (with a shout out to our neighbors for delicious wonton soup), a socially distanced family birthday celebration, Valentine’s Day, and then Monday off for President’s Day. It wasn’t a relaxing weekend but it sure was fun!
BIG changes with Google’s keyword options to share, plus other interesting items that the DBE team is discussing here that we want to share:
- Last Friday was Lunar New Year and Google’s Doodle celebrated the start of the Year of the Ox — which symbolizes hard work, positivity, and fertile harvest!
- “The Other 90” has a good piece this week on “The Science of Hype.” If you’re looking for a formulaic perspective on what makes a social post go viral, you’ll find how to predict “brand heat” here.
- Google is continually making updates and improving their understanding of intent to make it easier for advertisers to reach their target audience. This month, Google will be rolling out big changes to phrase match and broad match modifier. Several of our team members pointed to good articles on the subject, here are two very good ones, both by George Nguyen:
- How these changes will affect keyword match type behavior and how marketers should prepare.
- Google’s update around phrase match has benefits, but some advertisers are concerned. Here’s why.
- DBE has always used Google Trends to help guide and prioritize our keyword research. (Ask us how we identified the difference between “buy a house” and “buy a home” keywords if you want an example.) Search Engine Watch recently published this article on 11 do’s and don’ts that offer good reminders for leveraging Google Trends as part of your SEO toolbox.
- And one last Google-related note for the day–it may be shifting its force to the dark side. Search Engine Land reported Google is testing using a dark mode for the search interface (i.e., black background instead of the white background we are accustomed to). One noted potential impact is the further blurring (literally) of the distinction between ads and natural listings.
- Who else looks forward to the Superbowl commercials? Many marketers decided to serve comic relief rather than relatability this year. Marketing Dive conducted a deep dive on the emotional disconnect of the 2021 Superbowl commercials with the current world situation.
Do Good Spotlight: Sandy Hook Promise
This is a tough one to write about, so we’re not going to say much here, but parents who lost children in the Sandy Hook, CT shooting are working hard to keep all of our school children safe. If that cause resonates with you, please donate as we did. Learn more here.
The DBE team and I hope you enjoy this short week and that you get lots of good done in your slice of the world we share. Stay healthy, stay focused, stay strong!
